Huawei Ascend Mate 2 - First Impressions

What is the Huawei Ascend Mate 2?

The Huawei Ascend Mate 2 is the follow-up to the Huawei
Ascend Mate launched last year packing the same 6.1-inch display and a 4,050
mAh battery Huawei claims will last two days and has the ability to charge up
your other gadgets.

A rival for the Samsung Galaxy Note 3 and the Xperia Z
Ultra, the Android-powered phablet is quad-core powered, and comes with 4G.
There's a 13-megapixel main camera and 5-megapixel front-facing camera among
the most desirable and innovative new features.

Huawei Ascend Mate – Design and Screen

Measuring in at 9.5mm thick, it’s slightly thinner than the
first Mate (9.9mm) and weighs 202g so like its predecessor is actually
surprisingly light to hold in one hand for such a big phone.

The matte grey plastic has been replaced with a glossy white
look and silver band that’s gives it that cheap Samsung Galaxy look we are not
particularly the greatest fans of. It does also come in black so you are not
just restricted to the ‘Pure White’ version, though.

The back is removable where you’ll find the MicroSIM and
MicroSD card slots, although there’s no way to get at the battery.

Huawei has adopted the same quality display squeezing a 241
ppi pixel density into the 6.1-inch screen. While it only manages ‘720p HD’
resolution the quality is still strong. The IPS plus panel means viewing angles
are great and colours are excellently reproduced. For a mid-range phablet, the
Mate 2 is a more than suitable place to read on and watch movies.

Huawei Ascend Mate 2 – Features

The Mate 2 runs a customized version of Android 4.3 Jelly
Bean that Huawei calls Emotion 2.0. The company talked a lot about the idea
that Android as a UI can be complicated for some users to get to grips with so
its aim with the latest version of the Emotion UI is to make it easier to use.

One way it hopes to achieve this is by adding the new
One-Hand UI to make single-handed operation easier. The size of applications
shrink down so it’s a less of a stretch with the thumb. Huawei has also added a
new Floating Windows multitasking function to access functions like notes,
messages and the calculator much quicker.

It’s powered by a 1.6GHz quad-core Snapdragon 400 CPU with
2GB of RAM and an Adreno 306 GPU to take care of gaming. There’s 16GGB of
built-in storage backed up the MicroSD card support and there’s Bluetooth 4.0
built-in so it will play nice with devices like fitness trackers.

Both cameras sound impressive with the Mate 2 including a
13-megapixel BSI main camera from Sony that’s equipped with a 28mm lens, LED
flash, HDR and f/2.0 aperture to shoot better quality low-light pictures.

Up front is a 5-megapixel sensor with a f/2.4 aperture with
the ability to shoot vertical panorama shots and a new preview window to make
sure you are looking at the camera when you are taking selfies. For video
recording you can shoot footage in Full HD 1080p at 30 frames per second.

One of the most talked about features is the mammoth battery
that also featured in the original Mate. It has a larger battery capacity than
rival big phones like the Note 3 and the Xperia Z Ultra and Huawei claims will
give you two full days use and can handle 100 hours of music playback off a
single charge. Best of all, you can harness the battery power to charge up
other devices using a micro USB cable.

First impressions

For such a big phone, the Huawei Ascend Mate 2 fits
surprisingly well in one hand and with the battery staying power, the ability
to use it as an external battery charger and some two decent quality cameras
there’s a lot to like. What we are not particularly fans of is the design. The
white glossy plastic is not the prettiest and we hoped Huawei would have
attempted to create something more unique.

Currently, there are no details on UK pricing, but we
anticipate it to fall into the same £350 price bracket as the original making
it cheaper than the Samsung Galaxy Note 3. It should make for an affordable
alternative to Samsung's big phone, but we don't think it will be better.